Toronto Sun - Sunday, December, 17, 2000

PETER WORTHINGTON: Toronto Sun - Sunday, December, 17, 2000

KOREAN WAR MEMORIAL $70,000 SHORT

When I returned this spring from my first visit to Korea since the war, 50 years ago, I wrote about the campaign to have a modest monument erected in the UN cemetery at Pusan, to honour 378 Canadian soldiers who are buried there.

Defence Minister Art Eggleton visited Korea for 50th anniversary ceremonies and voiced approval for the idea of a monument "in principle," but National Defence and the Department of Veterans Affairs say monuments to honour war dead are not their mandate. DVA pays 6.6% of maintenance costs for the UN cemetery at Pusan. Period.

Some 2,300 soldiers from 11 of the 16 countries that fought in the Korean war are buried at Pusan. In all, the three-year war (1950-53) cost 115,000 allied lives - 58,000 of them South Korean soldiers, 54,000 American, the rest from other UN members.

My article last spring sparked cautious interest for a Monument to Canadian Fallen - estimated to cost around $100,000.

Since then, the idea has taken hold and become a cause headed by Canada's ambassador to South Korea, Arthur Perron (honorary chairman) and military attache Col. Chip Bowness. They've sent out letters, and received donations (address at the end of this column).

It's become something of a labour of love for those involved. A key figure keeping the dream alive, writing letters and doing bull work, is Vince Courtenay, a Princess Pat during the war who now lives mostly in Seoul. More than any individual, Courtenay helps vets returning to visit the country they helped save from the totalitarian north so long ago, and is determined to get a memorial in Pusan cemetery. Also working diligently are Sgt. Gerry Tummillo and wife Dianne of the Canadian embassy in Seoul.

RAMBUNCTIOUS CORPORAL

It turns out Vince and I were in the same battalion in Korea, but in different companies. I didn't know him then. Probably just as well; he was a rambunctious corporal, I a bemused platoon commander. Today we're both aging bores.

There's no downside to the monument proposal. Koreans, ever grateful, make a fetish of appreciating what was done on their behalf. Generations of schoolkids are exposed to the lessons of that precarious time.

Australians, Greeks and Turks have memorials in the Pusan cemetery, where Canadian dead have the site of honour.

The proposed monument, by a Korean artist, is a bronze life-size statue of a generic Canadian soldier with a Korean boy and girl (representing their future in freedom) who hold 16 maple leaves, symbolic of 16 Canadian soldiers buried in unknown graves.

The Seoul embassy is sending letters to Korean vets, and so far has received or been pledged something like $30,000. Veterans' groups are slow to get involved - and aren't that wealthy anyway. Canadian Legion members have shown more interest than the Legion hierarchy whose initiative has been dulled by caution and the status quo.

The Korean Veterans Association seems to be slowly getting more involved after initial lethargy at the top. KVA national president-elect Ken Blampied (ex-RCR) seems keen, and the Windsor local of the Canadian Auto Workers has already shown more financial enthusiasm than the government.

When the idea of a Monument to Canadian Fallen was first broached with Ottawa, various reasons were given why it couldn't work. They ranged from the South Korean government being against it (rubbish); that it would entail agreement from all countries whose soldiers are buried there (no problem); that the UN was opposed (nonsense); that money was tight and no one cared (maybe).

Koreans are the most encouraging. Myong-Laing Cho heads the Korean War Allies Association and runs the UN cemetery. He received the Order of the British Empire from the Queen when she visited a couple of years ago, and is eager for such a monument.

CENTRE OF THE CEMETERY

He personally took me to the spot where he hoped it would go - smack dab in the centre of the cemetery, with Canadian graves from the battle of Kapyong on one side, and Canadian dead from subsequent battles and actions on the other.

Representatives of every country involved in the war have already approved, and it's mostly the Ottawa bureaucratic syndrome of "anyone but us" that holds it back.

Rather than wait for DND, or Veterans Affairs, or the Defence Millennium Fund (which has already said no, but maybe for the 50th anniversary of the ceasefire in 2003), our gung-ho embassy in Seoul, aided by Courtenay and Canadians who've contributed, hopes to short-circuit bureaucratic nay-sayers and get the job done.

Canada doesn't have much of a military these days - restrictions have reduced its numbers, abilities and roles. While most Canadians have no direct links with the military, many come from families which responded in past wars when the country called.

There was national approval when a Vimy Ridge Canadian was brought home last year to be our unknown soldier - some 83 years after being killed in action in World War I.

Those who wish can send a contribution (no amount is too small) to the Monument to Canadian Fallen, c/o the Military Attache, Canadian Embassy, CPO 6299, Seoul, Republic of South Korea. All contributions will be acknowledged.